I completely agree with you. I was just eager to get there as the amount i was spending on commercial gold elixirs made the pursuit seem like an appropriate application of my time. However i should have started with a more economical metal.

Years ago I was at a lecture which had the late Laurance Guardner as a guest speaker. He stated that he could make this white powder of gold using a DC electric ark and 24K gold. He held up a tube filled with white powder and claimed it had been a 24k Canadian maple just the day before.